


Start Now

by Sage (the_ruined_earth_sagelord)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Absolutely Pure Fluff, Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, New Year's Eve, New Year's Kiss, as if that ain't a dead give-away lmao, kind of??, no yeah definitely
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2019-02-23 18:58:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13196490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_ruined_earth_sagelord/pseuds/Sage
Summary: “Kissing?” Kageyama screwed up his face. “But why do people do that for New Year’s?”





	Start Now

**Author's Note:**

> Happy New Year, here's some fluff to rot your teeth along with all the left-over Hershey's Kisses from Christmas your Grandma gave you :')

 

 

 

“But Kageyama,” Hinata whined, “it’s a _tradition_.” He butted his head into Kageyama’s shoulder.

“Since when?” Kageyama grumbled, shoving away Hinata’s face.

“Since…um…” Hinata put a finger to his chin, thinking hard. “Since now!” He beamed, pleased with himself. “We can start now.”

Kageyama made a disgusted face. “But why would we…you know…do _that_?”

“Because,” Hinata explained patiently. “It’s how you celebrate the New Year! It’s a way of showing, um, affection! And stuff! For—for people you…care about.”

Kageyama looked down at Hinata. The other boy was avoiding looking directly at him, keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the television in Kageyama’s living room. Ever since their first year, Hinata had spent New Year’s Eve at Kageyama’s house. He didn’t know how it started, but now it was their third year, and here they were again, in his room, watching some old guy in America count down the minutes to January 1st. It wasn’t even the traditional Japanese New Year, and Kageyama wondered why Hinata was so excited for—

“ _Kissing_?” Kageyama screwed up his face. “But why do people do _that_ for New Year’s?”

Hinata shrugged. “Dunno,” he said. He kept his voice light, but Kageyama heard something in it that made him narrow his eyes. He knew that Something. It came into Hinata’s voice when he was trying to keep a secret. The last time Kageyama heard that Something, Hinata had led him into a trap. Sixteen snowballs, several bruised arms, and one nearly unconscious Tanaka later, Kageyama had stood victorious amidst an ambush from his own team like some snarling wolf, and Hinata had just laughed from the sidelines, delighted.

He could be quite devious, and Kageyama had learned not to trust that Something.

“Hinata,” Kageyama said, lowering his voice threateningly. He reached over and yanked on the curls that Hinata was letting grow down over the back of his neck. Hinata yelped and jerked his head back. “What aren’t you telling me, dumbass?” Kageyama demanded. “What are you planning?”

“Nothing!” Hinata exclaimed. “How could you even _think_ that I, your best friend, would be _planning_ —”

“You’re not my best friend,” Kageyama said bluntly.

Hinata cringed. “Wow, rude, Bakayama. So what am I, then?”

“You’re…” Kageyama waved his hand vaguely in Hinata’s direction. “You’re, you know.”

Hinata raised one eyebrow. “No, I don’t know, dummy. What am I?”

Kageyama let his hand drop, exasperated. “Why does it matter?” he asked, trying to change the subject. “Why do we have to be ‘best friends’? I didn’t even know we were ‘friends.’ And, don’t forget.” He stood, slowly rising from the couch. On the TV, the announcer was screaming into his mic over the roar of the crowd. Some glittering ball was dropping to the ground. But Kageyama had eyes only for Hinata. “You’re my rival,” he said.

Hinata’s eyes flashed. He stood too, but he rose quickly, his chest heaving, his nostrils flared. Nothing about him was calm or slow. He was never steady and methodical, like Kageyama. No, everything had to be about speed with him. Everything had to be powerful and out in the open. He couldn’t just accept things the way they were. He had to _name_ everything.

Kageyama breathed hard now, and his pulse jumped. Where had all of _that_ come from? Was he still thinking about Hinata as a player? His speed? His ferocity? How weak he’d been when Kageyama had first met him? How strong he had become?

How dangerous he was.

Kageyama backed away from Hinata. This. This was dangerous.

“Why does it _matter_?” Hinata asked, repeating Kageyama’s words. His eyes were bright. They reflected the light from the TV, the glittering ball, the celebration of a new year going on all around them. But they were here, together, eyes locked on each other as if the whole world had grown still. Maybe it had. Maybe this was all that was left. Maybe this was all there ever had been: the two of them, eye-to-eye, standing at the top of the world, battling to be the best, destined to destroy the other—

Kageyama blinked.

_No_.

Hinata’s eyes were wet. His lip was trembling, but he was still trying to look stern.

_No, not that_.

Kageyama reached out, and put his hands on Hinata’s shoulders.

_Never that. Destroy him? Destroy us? This? How could I?_

He brought Hinata close to him, and Hinata immediately wrapped his arms around his waist.

_I don’t want that_.

“Why does it have to be as complicated as all that?” Kageyama murmured into Hinata’s hair. His arms dropped from Hinata’s shoulders to wrap around his back, holding him tight. “Why do you always have to make it so complicated?”

Hinata shook underneath his arms—from crying or laughing, Kageyama couldn’t say. “How is wanting to be your friend complicated?” he asked, his voice watery. Kageyama flinched inwardly. Crying, then.

“Because it is,” he said simply, expecting Hinata to understand.

Hinata rubbed his face up and down on Kageyama’s shirt, and Kageyama realized he was nodding. “Yeah,” Hinata said softly. “It is.”

Kageyama grunted. Of course Hinata had understood. Who else could he trust to understand—

Kageyama’s eyes widened. He looked down at the fluffy head of hair buried in his chest and sniffling into his shirt. Something in his chest squeezed. _I’m an idiot_ , he thought, wanting to smack himself. But he didn’t move his arms from Hinata’s back. Instead, he tightened them.

Hinata understood him.

And he understood Hinata.

“You don’t want us to be best friends,” Kageyama whispered.

Hinata stiffened in his arms. “Kageyama…”

“You don’t even want to be _just_ friends.” Kageyama squeezed a little tighter. He didn’t want to let Hinata go until he’d said what he figured out. Fortunately, Hinata wasn’t moving. Unfortunately, Kageyama wasn’t good at saying things out loud. But he wanted to say this. He wanted to try. For Hinata.

He wanted to start now.

Next to them on the TV, the ball was a couple dozen feet from reaching the ground. Kageyama didn’t notice it. He’d stopped noticing a lot of things, apparently. His own partner (he nearly choked just thinking about that— _partner_ ) was trying to confess something to him, and he couldn’t even hear it. Wasn’t he supposed to be the genius? Wasn’t he supposed to know Hinata as well as Hinata knew him?

“I really am an idiot,” he said. Hinata looked up at him, his face blotched red and wet from crying into Kageyama’s shirt. Hinata sniffed, his mouth wobbly. Kageyama smiled down at him, trying to make it as pleasant a smile as he could. Judging from how much redder Hinata’s face got, he was certain he’d succeeded. “I care about you too, dumbass,” he said softly. He lowered his face to Hinata’s. “I want to show…affection, sometimes, like you said. But it’s…it’s hard to know how to act lots of times. You move so fast. You move like light.”

Kageyama blinked. Had he really just said that?

Hinata stared at him, his mouth hanging open in a little ‘o’ of astonishment.

“I want to keep up with you,” Kageyama continued. “But I’m afraid.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “I’m afraid you’ll surpass me, or…or get bored, or—”

Hinata was shaking his head. His eyes were wide, his mouth pressed into a firm line. “ _Kageyama_ ,” was the only word he choked out before they both moved at the same time, like brightness over the dark earth, like a ball of light finally reaching the ground, and the new year begins again, and the past washes away in a moment of clean and pure understanding:

_We can start now. We can start again._

Kageyama kissed Hinata, and Hinata kissed Kageyama, just as the ball on the TV dropped, just as screams and cheers and whoops and tears roared from the little TV set, and an old brass band began paying _Auld Lang Syne_ , and all over the world, the brightness ate away at the dark, and life went on as it has forever, and love was shared, and love was given, and love was at the center of everything. And in a small room, two boys embraced, crying into each other’s shoulders with tears of joy, or sorrow, or anger, or love, or all of them. They kissed and kissed, and the New Year began with love.

_We can begin again_. _We can be better to each other, for each other_.

_We can start now_.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> sagechan.tumblr.com
> 
> Come sing 'Auld Lang Syne' with me <3


End file.
